


Coming to Light

by TidbitKit



Category: Paprika (2006)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 22:19:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5472635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TidbitKit/pseuds/TidbitKit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The beginning of Paprika, an early patient, and the need for honesty in order to grow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Coming to Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Melody_Jade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melody_Jade/gifts).



> Happy holidays!!

“Please don't panic. This is a dream.”

Her patient stared at her from amongst the rubble. He was breathing hard and shaking badly. Everything around them was in ruins, as though destroyed by an enormous earthquake which they hadn't happened to witness. She knew that if he panicked he would be woken up, and they had barely even started.

“You're fine. Everything's fine.” She took a step closer to him, but moved slowly so as not to startle him. “Do you want to go somewhere else? Do you want to look around?”

“I—I want to go home,” said the man, not moving from where he stood. A roof fell in and crashed to the ground behind him, but he didn't move. “I want to go home now.”

“Don't worry about a thing!” Paprika smiled and removed her hat, her outfit immediately that of a taxi driver's uniform, crisp and neat even amongst the rubble. “I'll take you wherever you need to go.”

They must have gotten into the taxi and out of the city, but they'd skipped ahead, suddenly driving with an unclear destination. She knew she was supposed to take him home, but he'd never told her where it was. She was only driving.

She glanced at his reflection in the rearview mirror. He was staring out the window at the trees lining the mountain road, paying no attention to her or where she drove. “Have you not been home for a while?” she asked, trying to lead him into talking about what he wanted and why.

“No,” he said, “It's been years.”

“Just busy?”

“No.”

He didn't go deeper than that. His eyebrows furrowed in thought, like he couldn't even remember what was deeper than that. Paprika shrugged and turned her eyes back on the road.

“I'm sure it'll be nice to see everybody,” she said, “Who all is waiting for you?”

“My mother is there.” His eyes squeezed tightly shut. He looked as though he was getting a headache. “And... there's...”

Paprika didn't think she'd even seen it run out of the trees. But suddenly she was swerving to avoid a creature in the middle of the road, what at the glance she got looked like a mix between a deer and a dog, or maybe some kind of spirit. 

The man screamed as they crashed through the forest, somehow nearly avoiding every tree but still feeling the bumps and the thrashes of the branches against the sides of the car. Paprika gritted her teeth and slammed on the brakes but nothing happened. The car rolled full speed down the mountain and finally she gave up on controlling it and threw open the door of the car and held out her hand to the patient in the back seat.

“Grab on!” She had to yell for him to hear her over his own screaming. “It'll be all right! Just hold on to me!”

The man took a deep breath, held it, and grabbed her outstretched hand.

They jumped out and seemed to fall sideways between the trees, the world shifting its gravity and the air becoming the depths of a deep dark water. The trees remained, sticking out of the large cliff that used to be the ground. Paprika had changed into a wetsuit and scuba gear, but her patient was still in his ordinary clothes, watching the car fall down further into the water and holding his free hand over his nose and mouth to keep in the air.

She started swimming up to the distant surface, pulling him along with her. Her patient was struggling, choking as his oxygen ran out and seeming to weigh a hundred pounds even in the water. Just as they were about to reach the surface, Paprika realized that there was nothing in her hand.

Her patient was gone.

She woke up to him gasping, sitting on his edge of the bed bent over and working to catch his breath. Paprika calmly sat up and removed the DC Mini from her scalp. 

“Take a minute to breathe,” she said, “We're done dreaming for today.”

Her patient looked back at her, half startled, as though he'd forgotten she was there. “You were with me.”

“Yes. It's incredible, isn't it?” She said it quietly as she got up off of the bed, walking over to him to take off his own DC Mini. “Would you like to watch the footage?”

“No. No. Not yet.” The patient wrung his hands together and rapidly tapped his foot. “A few more minutes.”

“Take your time.”

This was one of her first real patients with the DC Mini. But Paprika felt like she'd been doing this her whole life, treating dreams, exploring dreams, changing dreams. When they watched it over again and she listened to his thoughts on it, it was like a familiar routine, yet still somehow exhilarating. Someone else's mind was a whole new place and she wanted to dive back in, but she knew her patient wasn't ready.

“Until next time,” she said at the door, “Our mutual friend will be in touch with you.”

As Paprika drove out of the parking lot, Atsuko began driving to work.

–

Chiba Atsuko had been a quiet girl.

Top of her class, beautiful, eloquent. She was well liked by teachers, not disliked by her classmates. She had memories of people trying to be friends with her, and she hadn't pushed them away, but her time went into studies and those friends would eventually give up and move on. People would say that she was always in her own head. 

Eventually, she moved on to others'. The field of psychotherapeutic study gained a brilliant mind upon her graduation from university and beginning as an intern for the nation's top research facility.

It was in her third year, already a respected therapist and researcher, when she met Tokita Kōsaku.

They weren't formally introduced. Neither of them knew who the other was at the time, though Chiba had heard of Tokita, and Tokita had probably heard of Chiba and then forgotten about it. It was a small, insignificant meeting, Chiba standing outside her office looking over her schedule for the next week when she was bumped into from behind.

It was only a bump, but it was somehow enough to make her lose her balance and nearly fall, dropping her planner on the ground. She looked up to glare at the large young man about her age, who didn't seem to even notice he had run into her. He was moving quickly past her down the hall, carrying a heap of wires and tools without giving her a second glance.

Chiba frowned and called after him. “This is a facility with a lot of fragile equipment! You should be more careful!”

He stopped and turned back, his eyes big and bright and wide with confusion. “Huh?”

“You ran into me. You should watch where you're going, or you'll end up breaking something important.”

The man seemed to still not get it, blinking a few times and still staring at her with those big, bright eyes. “Did I break you?”

Chiba stared at him. She wasn't sure if he was making a joke or not. She didn't think he was. “I'm talking about equipment.”

“Oh!” He beamed at her. She'd never seen someone so huge look so much like a child. “I've done that before, but I always fix it! It's not a problem!”

He turned and continued walking away. His hurry looked excited and focused, not like he was trying to get away from her, but like he'd already forgotten their conversation.

She glared at him as he left, but the glare was weak. She was mostly confused by the whole interaction. She bent down to grab her planner, wanting to forget the whole thing but somehow unable to get that smile off her mind. 

“What a strange person.”

–

This dream was a quiet one. She was outside, by a small house in the mountains with clear air and long grass swaying around her. Paprika liked these kinds of dreams from time to time, but right now it felt constricting, boring. Her patient was standing next to her, staring out into the distant farmlands and keeping his back to the small mountain house.

“What are you thinking about?” Paprika asked, trying to move things along. For the first session she always let dreams move at their own pace for the sake of observation, but this was the second session now, and she wanted to start delving into the deeper problem.

The patient didn't answer her. She asked again. “What are you thinking about?” Paprika leaned a bit closer to him. She was dressed in an older style of school uniform, with a long skirt that fell below her knees. She was trying to play the role of a classmate, or maybe a visiting cousin. “Is something on your mind?”

When he responded, his voice was quiet and cracked. “The house,” he said, “It's on fire.”

“Fire?” Paprika looked back. The house looked fine. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” His mouth was dry. She could her his tongue getting unstuck from the roof of his mouth. “We'll lose everything.”

“What's in the house?”

“Our clothes. Our food. Our furniture.” The things were listed off without concern. But the patient didn't turn around. “My grandmother. My dog. And that.”

“That?”

“And that.”

“There may still be time. To get everything out,” she said, reaching out as though to touch him but not putting her hand on him. “Look behind you. The house is still fine.”

“Whenever I look, I wake up.” A lucid thought amongst the recurring dream. It was a small step, but Paprika took note of it. 

“I don't think you will this time.” She put her hand on his shoulder now, a comforting touch, and a change to the dream's routine to allow things to shift. “Look back. I'm here with you. I'll help you if it's bad.”

He was silent. But after a moment, he started turning back, his eyes staying on the distant fields as long as he could manage while he turned. When he was facing the house, it stayed the same, but his eyes filled with tears and he stumbled back away from it. 

“She's...” He kept walking away from the house, raising his arms as though to shield his face. “She's still inside!” 

Paprika watched as the man wept, allowing him to cry and fall to his knees. She didn't interfere now. The house stayed standing, and the man was only crying, but she felt heat coming off him and smelled smoke rising up from his clothes.

He woke up crying but couldn't tell her what it meant or why he was so upset. She told him the date and time of their next session and told him to get some rest.

–

At first, Chiba had hated Paprika.

Paprika was ideal for using the DC Mini, but she wasn't made for it. Chiba had had her long before Tokita, before the facility, before she'd even started high school. It's possible that Paprika had always been around. But she got her name and face when Chiba was first starting middle school, appearing in a dream and then deciding to never leave.

Chiba half recognized her face when she appeared. She looked like an amalgamation of models from the fashion magazines her mother gave her, with bits and pieces of Chiba's own face. Paprika was a girl her age but prettier, wilder, fun and sociable and warm and unafraid to tell others how she felt. Chiba hadn't tried to make Paprika. But her brain had produced her, and from then on whenever Chiba chose to do things one way, Paprika would be behind her, saying what she thought would be better to do and teasing her for never being any fun.

Chiba had hated her. She'd completely hated her. Everything she did got criticized, but not even in the way she was used to. She could handle being told she had to work harder at her studies. She was used to it. But after Paprika came, any time she was hard on herself for getting below a perfect score she would hear that voice in her head, her own brain telling her she was worrying too much and to work a little less. She would feel lazy for even hearing it and only pushed herself to work harder, getting angrier and angrier as doing so only made Paprika criticize her more.

Studying late at night she would feel Paprika lazing around on the bed, though she knew if she turned around she would see only air.

“You know you've got perfect grades already, don't you?” she said as Chiba read over the homework for the third time. “You should take a break. Those girls in class were talking about karaoke earlier. Ask them if you can go.”

“I can't just invite myself.” Chiba started reading the page again. Paprika had distracted her from her place.

“Sure you can. Sometimes you need to just put yourself in situations where what you want will happen.”

“I'm not doing that.” Chiba sighed and closed her book. She'd basically memorized it already anyway. “If they ask me to go, I'll consider it.”

Paprika smirked. “Will you? Or are you just saying that so I'll be quiet?”

“You're never quiet.”

“Oh! That's almost rude!” Paprika smiled and sat up. “Go on, tell me to shut up!”

“No.”

“Come on, Atsuko, you can do it!”

Chiba groaned. “Paprika—“

Paprika started clapping and chanting. “Shut! Up! Shut! Up! Shut! Up!”

“Shut up!” 

Paprika quieted down immediately. Chiba had shouted it, more loudly than she'd probably meant to. She'd even turned to look at her, glaring at where she knew Paprika was even if it wasn't real.

Paprika smiled. “Feel better?”

Chiba was turning red. She normally tried to not even speak to Paprika out loud. Her parents were downstairs...

“It feels good, doesn't it?” Paprika was still smiling, but something in her voice sounded more serious than usual. “Telling people off when they're making you feel bad?”

Chiba was still blushing, but she looked at the ground quietly, knowing what Paprika was trying to get at. But she wouldn't give her the satisfaction of knowing she'd made a point. Chiba turned back to her homework and opened the book again, ready to start over a fourth time.

Paprika sighed but kept smiling. “Oh Atsuko, you're so boring.”

“Be quiet.”

Paprika laughed. “Okay, okay.”

– 

“Would you like to go home?”

It was the same dream as their initial meeting. Her patient stared at her, frightened and surrounded by the earthquake's remains. Paprika was already in her taxi uniform, ready to move things along.

“I'm here to take you wherever you need to go,” she said, gesturing to the sparkling clean yellow taxi behind her, parked between a collapsed building and a large crack in the middle of the road. “Wouldn't you like to go home?”

The man nodded. 

They were driving up the mountain road, the man staring at the trees, Paprika watching the man in the reflection of the rearview mirror. He was paying no attention to her, and though she was looking at him she was always keeping half an eye on the road ahead, even as she was driving perfectly without a single bump.

Her hand slid to the dial on the dashboard. “Do you mind if I turn on the radio?”

The man shook his head.

She turned the dial and set it to a talk radio station. She listened quietly as the news report played. Her focus was now on the road, her half eye on the man's reflection. 

The voice of the woman on the radio sounded old and frail. “A forest fire occurred at 11:23 AM this morning. Authorities did all they could, but...”

Paprika saw the man turn to listen out of the corner of her eye. The woman went on to describe the details of the damage and the civilians affected. Paprika couldn't quite see it, but she knew he had gone pale.

She quietly shut the radio off and pulled to a stop in the middle of the road.

“It's looking at you.” 

Her patient looked up at the creature in the road. His breathing stopped.

Though the sun was bright, the creature's face was impossible to make out, falling both under complete shadow and a blinding glare. Paprika had been right: anatomically, it was definitely some kind of mix between a deer and a dog, tall and strong but with long fur and a long tail. 

It stood completely still. Though they couldn't see its eyes, it must have been looking at him. They both knew it was.

“Please get off the road,” the patient whispered, “Please...”

“What's the matter?” Paprika didn't move the car, but she kept the doors shut and locked. “Does it scare you?”

“Please, this is... That's...”

The creature took a step forward. The patient screamed.

He woke up gasping for breath again. Paprika smoothly got up off of the bed, removing the DC Mini as she walked to the laptop where she could find the footage.

“Stop,” he said from behind her, “I remember it all.”

“It's for me, too.” She picked up the laptop and brought it back to the bed where he was sitting. “You can go shower. I'll watch this for reference, and we can discuss it when you're ready.”

The man stayed silent as he got up. But he paused at the door to the bathroom. “I don't know if this treatment is working for me.”

“Really?” Paprika looked up from the laptop, though her hands stayed at the keyboard. “I think we've been making good progress.”

“Is it worth going through this every time though? These same dreams? I want to just... not think about it! I don't want to deal with them!”

Paprika looked at him for a moment quietly and then looked again at her computer. “It's true, the DC Mini is able to project specific dreams. As long as we have its data recorded, I can make you dream whatever I want.” She glanced back up at him. “But I haven't projected any dreams into your subconscious. You're having these dreams on your own, and I'm helping you get further into them, to better understand them.” She smiled. “You'd have to deal with them anyway... I'm just helping you not deal with them alone.”

The man said nothing. She went back to the footage. When he came out of the shower he was ready for discussion.

“What do you think the animal is from?” she asked him, scrolling through image search results of different species of deer. “Were you attacked as a child?”

“No. Nothing like that.” 

“It could be a symbol.” She closed the search results. Nothing looked quite right. “It could represent a mystery you never solved. Or an unexpected event that changed your life.”

The man flinched. It didn't look as though he wanted to speak much, but he muttered, “Yes, that could be it.”

Paprika sighed. “You know, I'm here at your request?” She shut down the laptop. “I understand these things are difficult to talk about. But I need you to talk things through with me if you want us to get to any breakthroughs.”

The man flinched again. “...I apologize.”

“It's all right.” Paprika smiled at him, slipping the laptop into her bag. “I know it's hard. These things are very personal to you. And I'm a stranger who's getting into your head, and it's scary.” She laughed. “There are a lot of people who could probably relate to you. Or at least one that I know.” As she stood, she handed him a business card with the next time and date to meet. “But let's try to work together, okay? And things will be a lot easier.”

“...Yes.” He took the card, smiling back at her with a bit of trouble, but there was a genuine effort. “I understand. I'll try.”

“I think we're getting close,” said Paprika. She walked to the door. “Hang in there until then.”

She sighed on the other side of the door. “You'll be shocked hearing this, Atsuko,” she said to herself, “But I could use a nap!”

–

Chiba Atsuko and Tokita Kōsaku became partners during Chiba's fifth year working at the facility.

She vaguely remembered him bumping into her when they met again, but not enough to care much. She had heard of him in detail since that time: his brilliance, his ingenuity, his future in the industry. He had heard just as much about her, but he only half remembered it. Still he seemed excited to work with her. Chiba was not as thrilled, but she was interested, at the very least.

A year working together passed. Then a second. Soon five, and then nearly seven. They were the surprise team of the facility, a strong partnership producing incredible results from two young people who had at first seemed poorly matched. With the help of Chiba, Tokita stayed focused enough to finish many industry-changing inventions; with the help of Tokita, Chiba enjoyed her work.

It was after Tokita had proposed the DC Mini that Chiba told him about Paprika.

“So is she another you?” Tokita asked, finishing off his fourth bun within the last ten minutes. “Or another person who hangs around with you, but in your head?”

Chiba was struggling to keep her composure. “You don't believe me.”

“Oi, that's not true, At-chan.” Tokita pouted. “I'm just trying to get how it works.”

“...it's hard to say.” Chiba looked out the window, avoiding Tokita's bright and curious eyes. “I think of her as part of me. But she's her own person in a lot of ways, too. I don't speak for her.”

“Maybe with the DC Mini I'll be able to ask her about it all myself!” Tokita grinned as he grabbed another bun. “What does she think?”

Chiba glanced at him and smiled despite herself. “She's not talking right now,” she said, “But I'm sure she'd like to meet you.”

She had known going into the project that it would most likely be Paprika who would really get to use the DC Mini. Chiba couldn't remember the last time she had had a dream where she was herself; Paprika had been in charge of the dreaming side of her for nearly twenty years. So she'd felt it was necessary to tell Tokita about Paprika. But Paprika liked to tease her about telling Tokita first, and only telling Tokita, and letting the others on the project figure it out for themselves.

The Chief had been most excited.

“Who was that?”

When they woke up the Chief was looking at her, his eyes bright and refreshed. He seemed wide awake not only from the nap but from an immense curiosity, or more an enthrallment, like he'd met the person he'd most wanted to meet in the world.

“Was that you? That girl?” His smile somehow grew wider. “Who was she?”

Chiba felt all her planned responses fly by, along with urges to panic and to lie. She had prepared herself for every reaction, and this one didn't come as a surprise to her. But sleeping only with the DC Mini somehow made her more exhausted, and she found she didn't have the energy or the will to lie, and couldn't think of a reason to anyway.

“Paprika,” she said, “That was Paprika.”

“Paprika,” the Chief repeated, still just as excited. He laughed. “Your dream self, was she?”

“It's different from that,” she said, pulling the DC Mini out of her hair. “I'll tell you another time.”

“Paprika...” The Chief seemed distant. “I'd like to see that side of you again.”

Chiba glanced at him, and then away again. “Another time.”

The Chief sighed. In a way, he was still dreaming.

–

Her patient didn't need to fall asleep this time before he was able to discuss things. He'd had a week to think, and a dream journal with nearly a dozen pages that were completely full. Amongst them was a newspaper clipping, old and somewhat faded, with a picture of a burnt fallen tree in the center of the page.

“I remembered this,” he said, handing her the clipping but not looking at her. “Well, I... I mean I remembered that I had this clipping. I honestly remembered what it was from, for a while now.”

“You're ready to open up?” she asked, taking the paper and looking it over. Of course, she knew what it was about; she'd already seen his subconscious, and knew his worries. But records were always good to have. “I knew you could do it. It just takes some time for everyone.”

He smiled a little, but his face was very serious. She sat next to him and allowed him to speak.

A neglectful father. A kind grandmother. And a story of the mountain god, who demanded respect for the forest from the humans he allowed to live in it. One his grandmother had told him often as a child, intended to teach him to take care of their home. One that was used against him later, on the day that it happened. A lit cigarette and a spilled bottle of alcohol out in the woods, and a convenient child, used for the blame when the police asked what caused the fire.

It didn't matter what the child had just lost. It didn't matter what they'd both just lost. It was his fault. He heard it from his own father: It was his fault.

Her patient cried. In his dream that night, he reached out to the god and he told it he was sorry. The god had the face of an old woman, kind and forgiving, assuring him that he'd never been at fault.

Paprika left the room satisfied with their work. Chiba reminded her that a breakthrough didn't always mean that work was done. But they left for the facility together, satisfied that at the very least this patient was no longer in need of the DC Mini, or Paprika.

–

“I need Paprika.”

Chiba stared at her superior, unsure what to say. “And what do you need her for?”

The Chief glanced around, although they were clearly alone, aside from Tokita tinkering with another DC Mini prototype in the corner of the lab. The Chief moved closer and gestured for her to lean in.

“Chiba-kun, you can keep a secret, can't you?” he whispered with a wink. “It's nothing immoral. Just maybe illegal.”

“Please get to your point.”

“I have a few friends,” he said, “Who have been having bad dreams.”

Chiba understood quickly what he was getting at. She glanced towards Tokita, and the DC Mini in his hands. 

The Chief smiled nervously. “Do you think you'd be able to help?”

She chuckled. “Black Market therapy?”

“It's nothing so insidious. I only want my friends to be happy.” He grinned. “You did an amazing job treating me, and I know they could use the help, even if they have trouble admitting it sometimes.”

Chiba smiled. “Paprika will be in touch.”


End file.
